Uncle Vanya

by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

Published December 1964
ChekhovAIs tragicomedy, replete with the kinds of characters we have come to know as Chekhovian,O incorporates unrequited loves and a murder plot while exploring the social roles of women and the notion of progress. Plays for Performance Series.

Three Sisters

by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

Published December 1949

Chekhov's penultimate play has inspired a bewildering variety of
interpretations - both in criticism and in performance - since its
premiere at the Moscow Arts Theatre in 1901. Tri sestry has
been viewed both as tragedy and comedy, as a testimony for the eternal
yearnings for love, happiness and meaning, and as a devastating
indictment of the folly of inert gentility. Its characters have been
seen as worthy embodiments of the universal 'human condition', or as
passive products of pre-revolutionary Russian privilege. Either way,
the sisters are poignant reminders of human disappointment,
frustration, loneliness and the passage of time. The play remains a
firm favourite with audiences, both in Russia and in the
English-speaking world, and must be considered a fundamental work of
twentieth-century European drama.


Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright David Mamet, in this unique adaptation of one of the great masterpieces of the theater, allows us to see Anton Chekhov's "The Cherry Orchard" in totally new and surprising ways. As Mamet explains in his introduction, he views the play "as a series of scenes about sexuality and, particularly, frustrated sexuality" rather than about a dying Russia. The result, said 'The Sentinel, ' "blows a gust of fresh air into the old play" while the Chicago Sun-Times called it "audacious [and] consistently arresting." "Mamet the adaptor has turned Chekhov's Cherry Orchard into a Mamet play. Mamet's ear is famously impeccable, the dialogue is always authentic and convincing . . . . This is a tribute to its strong point of view and clear point of departure. If nothing else, it will help to undermine our silly critical notions of 'definitive' Chekhov. Mamet has made me rethink the play." - Robert Brustein, 'The New Republic'

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov(1860-1904) may be likened to his contemporaries, the "pointilliste" painters. Piece by piece, episode by episode, character by character, he constructs in prose a survey of the human condition. as David Magarshack writes in his introduction, on reading these stories 'one gets the impression of holding life itself, like a fluttering bird, in one's cupped hands'.

Anton Chekhov has long been regarded as the master of the Russian short story and one of the leading exponents of the genre in world literature. This volume comprises the classic selection edited by Birkett and Struve, in Russian, here furnished with a new bibliography, and complements the stories and plays by Chekhov already available in the BCP Russian Texts series. The twelve stories, which date from 1883 to 1896, range from miniatures of comic levity such as Tolsttyi i tonkii to stories of sophisticated maturity such as Dom s mezoninom. The stories included are as follows (titles given in English translation): Fat Man and Thin Man; The Boys; A Test for Rank; A Failure; A Little Joke; The Blank Catch; The Beauties; The Student; At Yuletide; An Incident in Practice; Anna Round the Neck; The House with the Mezzanine.


Three Stories

by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

Published 1 July 1984

This book contains the Russian text of Chekhov's Three Stories and is accompanied with an introduction and notes.


Three Farces

by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

Published 1 January 1998